


Changing Viewing Patterns

by yourlibrarian



Category: Fandom - Fandom
Genre: Gen, Meta, Nonfiction, Television Watching
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-03-08
Updated: 2021-03-08
Packaged: 2021-03-15 05:41:06
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,296
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29928741
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/yourlibrarian/pseuds/yourlibrarian
Summary: Having written more recently about howfan television habitsmay be changing fandom itself, this look back suggests it started happening much earlier but for similar reasons.Originally posted May 4, 2007.
Kudos: 2
Collections: March Meta Matters Challenge





	Changing Viewing Patterns

I seem to [keep coming back to this issue lately](https://archiveofourown.org/works/29926419) about what watching a show even means anymore. I think in part it's because watching has become such a tiered thing. There was no way, unless I simply couldn't manage it that night, that I would wait a day to see a new Buffy or Angel ep back when they were on the air. This was equally true of shows I'd really enjoyed in the past. Nowadays though watching a show can be a really staggered thing and sometimes it's because of the broadcasts themselves.

For example no one's watching BSG until next year, except maybe on DVD or through On-Demand viewing. People who say they're watching actually mean they are waiting to watch, are catching up on the show, or are rewatching episodes. Not so long ago it used to be that when a show ended its season, it would still be on the air, only in reruns throughout the summer, which was handy if you'd missed stuff or wanted to see episodes again. A viewer used to be able to be a viewer all year long (obviously I'm speaking of U.S. and maybe Canadian viewing patterns here, though it would be very interesting to hear how viewing has or hasn't changed in other countries). 

This interruption to viewing occurs in less dramatic ways during the "new season" itself when there are gaps of weeks or months between one part of the season and the next. And some shows have really short seasons (i.e. Dancing With the Stars runs only part of a season, Queer as Folk moved to 13 episodes). This means that viewers actually spend more time NOT watching than seeing the shows. The increasingly staggered seasons, where shows may start not only mid-season but abruptly whenever another show gets yanked, then appear for only a few episodes also means people may not prioritize watching. So people who are "watching" may actually be months behind on a show and it just means that it's hosted on their TiVO or a pile of tapes is joining another pile for eventual viewing. So "watching" is becoming as much of an intention as an actual practice.

Then too, there is the question of how that watching takes place. Many people may never even turn on an actual TV anymore because it's all internet and DVDs. When talking about a show I'm watching I mentioned "Due South" -- a show that's been off the air for years, whose DVDs are sitting here. I was on the cusp of finishing its first season before several shows came back from break, and the weeks have been too busy since to do more than stay current with those. We also had a taping snafu this week so I saw the latest Veronica Mars on the CW website. However I wasn't able to go farther back this season to see episodes of SPN I missed because they're not up there, and at least one link I found for them elsewhere wasn't working anymore. So even stuff I'd like to be watching I can't at the moment. 

Then there is the difference between what I "watch" and what I'm various levels of fannish about. We watch (I believe) twelve shows currently being broadcast. Shows like Andy Richter and Drive came and went so fast they barely made the list, and other shows we would have been watching never came back from hiatus. There's the pending DVD set, as well as other shows I have the intention of picking up in the future. There's also Buffy and Angel which we rewatch from time to time as well as assorted other shows we've seen in the past. Of those, I'm only fannish about seven of them and I'm not even involved in the fandom of two of them -- BSG and Heroes. I never got involved in BSG because I watch the show with a significant delay and didn't want to be spoiled because the show has a lot of continuity. I never got into Heroes because I was already too busy and with less than a season under its belt I didn't want to make the effort. I may or may not in the future, I don't know. 

Then there's the way fannishness relates to things we do in response to watching -- where we might look up vids and fic and meta. I did a little of this with QaF, I did a bit of reading and vid watching, got some icons, etc. But I got into it towards the middle of the series and I was out of synch since I didn't get Showtime and so I wanted to avoid spoilers. SPN is the first fandom I've started really reading and watching in since the Buffyverse. I prioritized seeing all of S1 as quickly as possible (luckily it came during still more breaks for VM, Heroes and SPN) because I wanted to be able to understand the fic, vids, meta, and even currently broadcast episodes which would be difficult without having absorbed much of the canon. And SPN is a show that still does a number of standalone type episodes. By comparison Heroes is a mess if you don't see it in order, it's a show that completely depends on continuity. If NBC hadn't done a marathon of its first episodes early on I probably wouldn't be watching it yet. Which just makes me more aware of how difficult it has become for people to all be watching something at the same time (by which I mean the same week, not even the same day), and how one's fannish experience changes considerably because of that. 

For example in the Buffyverse there is no show to keep up on but the comics now have a significant number of people reading. However they come out slowly and there's plenty of time for people to catch up even if their comics stores are sold out or they get issues late for some reason. In SPN there's still a weekly (more or less) show and canon shifts slightly every time an episode airs. There are bursts of production -- new icons, vids and short stories as well as discussion. It happens fast and it's a completely different feeling of involvement if one is in synch with that or not. I can't imagine what it's like to be a soap fan and have stuff going on daily if one is really fannish about it.

All of which is a very long way to say, how do people define what they "watch" and how much does the way they watch have to do with whether they are fannish or become involved in a fandom? For example, when people entered the world of multi-channel TV (cable as opposed to just broadcast) they still might not have been able to record content. And from the distribution end, networks have wrecked shows by showing them out of order or so spaced out that one misses a show's return. Did they have options to buy or rent DVDs and if so could they get a hold of them quickly? Does ready availability is breeding slackness? Is there something to be said for knowing that you're following a show at the same time as thousands of others and being affected by the squee, and getting to share it with a community of like-minded people in real time?

Meanwhile he more academic minded among us may be interested in [Henry Jenkins post](http://www.henryjenkins.org/2007/05/genre_theory_and_implicit_cont.html) about contracts between audience and producer which I think are often raised in fan discussion about how shows do or don't meet expectations, but in the case of this topic may also related to the things like the reliability of access to content.


End file.
